Hello All,I've been modelling since aged 10, but got fed up with either crashing aircraft models or seeing them vanish for ever into the distance !Model engineering started thro' a family friend when aged 13 years and subsequently I've built 20 live steam locos 3 1/2" to 7 1/4", four Burrell traction engines in 3" & 4" scales as well a stationary/marine engine collection.Machine tools and allied accessories have added to the mix over the years culminating in the workshop that has evolved over sixty years. It measures some 6 feet x 15 feet and is stuffed with all the 'bits' that have built up. Having a small workshop space attached to the house has its advantages; 10 minutes can be 'found/earned/allowed', but organisation is paramount and easy access important. I like things close-to-hand; having to looking for 'things' wastes valuable workshop production time!I've attached a few pictures of the workshop as a precursor to describing some of the stages and processes involved in the building my current project, a Corliss Duplex Triple Expansion mill engine that some may find interesting or even helpful. I'll judge what content to put up by any responses/ interest shown....or not.....Regards, Stuart

That looks like a shop that's seen some use for sure 'Jack' Always thought I had used up all the space in mine but can see I have a fair way to go to catch up with yours Memory is a big thing for me these days - recently spent some time trying to find a mitre clamp/saw guide that I know I have, know I've stored somewhere 'logical' but not of course in the most logical space - still can't find it

Regards - Tug

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"I ain't here for the long time but I am here for a good time"(a very apt phrase - thanks to a well meaning MEM friend)

When I opened the first pic I thought someone had photographed my workshop after changing its predominant colour from green to red. Nice to see how it's possible to keep a lot of items in a small space but tidy. Mine's a tip at the moment, still as I left it when I was rushed into hospital in May. Must get on and sort it.Jerry

Thanks for showing us the workshop, Stuart. Amazing what a comprehensive set up you have shoehorned into your available space, and the record of your model making productivity is very impressive. Have you shared that workshop space with 4" scale traction engine(s) ? Like Ramon, maybe I need to rethink my ideas on what can be got into the workshop space! Dave

Hi All,Thanks for your replies/comments on my posting about the workshop...it was my opening piece to some details of the Corliss mill engine but I thought some intro may help.As you will have seen, the workshop is compact, but it's amazing what can be produced in such a space.The 4" Burrell Compound 'Gold Medal' tractor was the biggest item made in there; it was a bit of a squeeze, but the overhead winch on universal beam above the assembly bench allowed me to lift assemblies, spin them etc.. Getting it out was via a hydraulic lift table to it's parking area in the corner of the conservatory; parking rights having been granted by the domestic authority, bless her. She's very supportive....but at least she knows where I am...I'm not downing ale somewhere then p......ing up the porcelain!!!Castings were not available for the 4" GM Burrell commercially so I scaled up some 2" drawings and then it came down to pattern-making and casting made up in grey iron for cylinders, hubs etc. and SG iron for the front axle and crankshaft....Oh! what fun...but it's only a hobby, a friend used to say !!PS. I really wanted to build a 4" Burrell compound road locomotive, but that just was not possible in the space...."Cut your coat to suit you cloth".Pics attached of 3" Burrell agricultural engine getting steam up...the furry driver-in-waiting, my old workshop pal Smudge ready for action !

Hi Carl,You're correct about the scales 4" to the foot = 1/3rd full size.'Titon', the engine in the recent pics. is 3" scale = 1/4 FS.In live steam loco terms over on this side of the pond full size prototypes (4'8 1/2"G) ...... 3/4" sc. rides on 3 1/2" gauge tracks, 1" sc on 5". (In some parts of the US they use 4 3/4"G)I'm very fond of narrow gauge, over here 600mm/ 2ft. gauge in the main.My 'Charles' a Hunslet(Leeds) engine and the ALCO(US) 2-6-2 run on 3 1/2"G (about 1/7FS) as does 'Lew' from the Lynton to Barnstable RailwayHunslets 'Rough Pup' and 'Velinheli' run on 5"G (more than 5th FS)In answer to the question you didn't ask, the wife's not the one with the whiskers!Cheers, All the best

Thanks for the comments on my roundhouse of locos (which is actually rectangular!), the others (4) are in our lounge with the stationary engines, all with acrylic covers, thank goodness, saving them from dust. There were six others that I've built...all have gone over the years to fund other projects, cars etc..The 'Model Engineer' mags I still have all from 1954 when I started subscription, and collected back issues to '38 and many before...at least they keep the loft warm and are a terrific resource for any club member building anything. I've got to clear them out someday soon...tempus fugit!My local club in Nantwich (S.Cheshire ME) 15 miles away has a 3 1/2" & 5" track a sixth of a mile long...many happy hours steaming there.Anyway, I'll post some details and pics. of the Corliss Duplex soon. Leave with a non-domesticated model engineer...attached

Anyway, so much for the preface...the Corliss engine awaits.I acquired a set of castings at a club sale about 10 years ago. They had been donated by a dear friend who'd given up active live steam loco building due to failing sight. The ice cream box they came in weighed a ton !The original design with its many variations, was the brainchild of Arnold Throp of Sheffield who I had the pleasure befriending at Northern Association of ME meetings.He had written up a description of the engine in 'Model Engineer', I think in '78. ('Yes' 1978!). He had made up wooden patterns for the necessary castings. The indomitable Peter Southworth rescued the patterns and started producing casting sets. Upon his passing Bob Potter has picked up the baton still trading as 'Southworth Engines'.The castings were to build a duplex (pair of engines with common crankshaft) with high pressure one side and low pressure 'tother with a condenser/'air pump' in tandem with the HP side (common through piston rods).I planned to build the pair of engines with a HP/condenser one side and intermediate/low pressure the other side. For this arrangement I needed a common bedplate for the IP/LP side.The castiron bedplates were milled on the bottom and end surfaces. The centreline of each bedplate was carefully marked on all relevant surfaces and a set of jig-drilled holes for fitted bolts completed. With temporary bolts fitted the whole of each side's bedplates could be set up on the miller and the the crankshaft bearing seats, cylinder bolting pads etc could be accurately machined. The keen-eyed will see that the combined IP & LP bed is made of aluminium it wasn't in the castings I obtained. That's the most tedious bit done now....if there is interest expressed in my continuation of the build I will try to do justice to the task. Cheers

Re your preface - I think you need to check the fuel tank inside - sometimes the vent hole gets blocked and causes a vacuum Bugger to start once that happens,

Looking forwards to your comments on this engine as time progresses which will compliment my own. Are you aware Arnold only made the patterns for a single (the one in ME) If you take a look at my thread post 1 and 21 it's mentioned there as I was the culprit who convinced Peter to do me some castings.

I mention Terry Fleet whom Arnold did the original design for - he's still about and I see him from time to time - all being well he'll have his duplex version at 'LowMex' this year

Reegards - Tug

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"I ain't here for the long time but I am here for a good time"(a very apt phrase - thanks to a well meaning MEM friend)

The crankshaft is a single shaft with flywheel, gear eccentrics etc. keyed onto it.Some Corliss engines had tandem cylinders in a single engine arrangement with a outrigger bearing fixed to the enginehouse floor.I've attached a pic. of my build as-is part completed/assembled, started November 2017. Build on hold at present for running locos on club track/grass-cutting/gardening/holidays etc.......

Hi All,I next chose to do the flywheel. Much as I would have liked the double width wheel, I used the one to hand.I fastened the wheel to an angle plate that was set true to the X axis and milled the joint face carefully to cut where the barring teeth were so that the assembled teeth lined up.My dear wife bought me digital readout for the lathe about 15 years ago for Christmas, and a 3-axis one for the miller the year after. Such a boon ! One of the best pressies I've ever had....well next the the best she says !!Using the d.readout I set-out the fastening pin holes in the hub and outer flange.I could have made up a jig plate to do the job as an alternative.Fitted bolts were made and the wheel assembled. It was then fastened to the miller table on packings and centred with a dti. and the hub faced off.The cored hole in the hub was then opened out to reaming size (-.010") with a boring head and finished with a Brown & Sharp floating reamer. Hole size was checked with a plug gauge made up to crankshaft diameter.My lathe, (a 5"DST 'Viceroy') was not quite big enough to machine the outside diameter and so I called upon pal Pete to use his Colchester Student. Mounted on a true-running nutted mandrel, the outside diameter was turned and the rope grooves put in with a vee tool mounted in what was a boring tool. Cheers Stuart

Hi,The overall diameter of the flywheel is 10".As with full-size flywheels the sections are bolted together with fitted bolts, an interference fit in the holes.Many wheels weighing 30 tonnes or more were built with two, four, six sectors...sometimes more dependant on the number & positioning of the spokes.The outer barring teeth, used to turn the engine off dead-centres, were'barred' 'round with a lever and fulcrum block to the side of the wheel. Some other larger power configurations had a 'barring engine', a small auxiliary steam engine with a pinion on the driven shaft that was pushed into engagement with the wheel teeth and withdrawn when the main engine came on power.Cheers, Stuart

Hi All,When building a project like the Duplex Corliss there are often different courses towards the (hopeful) final result.................. Having got the baseplates all temporarily assembled and the crankshaft bearing seatings machined I decided to work on the crankshaft components so that I had somewhere to hang the flywheel made in the last instalment.The caps for the pedestal bearings were machined up from the gunmetal casting inherited with the casting set previously mentioned. The split 'brasses' were made up from blocks of machined-up phosphor bronze and soft soldered together so that the bore and the chamber for the oiling ring could be machined. A pic of the 'internal' chamber tool attached.The solder is then melted and the parting faces lightly clean-up on fine emeryboard.In the parts pile I hadn't shown this ring, which just a plain thin washer made of PB, it runs over the crankshaft and it 'drips' into the oils sump seen in the pedestal bearing base.I've shown a pic of the crankshaft/big end of 'Elsie' a 180hp tandem compound engine held at the Northern Mill Engine Museum. She was built by McNaughts in 1902 to power a cotton mill. (HP and LP cylinders sharing a common piston rod.)

Hi All,Thanks Thomas for the compliment....I try...well my mother found me trying!!I had a few problems putting the pics up last session, so I'll try again. 'Elsie' is the Corliss tamdem at the Norther Mill Engine Museum.I've put up a couple of pics of machining the eccentric rods. They are rather slender items 5.5" (145mm) long; large diameter 3/16" (5mm) small end 0.140 (3.5mm)The top slide travel is some 2.5"; so I opted for the set-over centre method using a No.2 MT boring headwith a ball-bearing centre up the spout. I try to avoid setting over the tailstock and disturbing the accurate alignment. This enabled me to use the power feed to the saddle making the job less onerous and giving a better finish. Having five rods to make...two for each Corliss cylinder (HP & IP) and one for the low pressure slide valve cylinder. Cheers,Stuart

More pics. Taper turning the connecting rods from heavier section black (hot rolled) steel to avoid distortion after machining....also cheaper !The 'brasses' made up from phosphor bronze with adjusting wedge. Small end is fitted with lubricator, the bigend is lubricated by a rotating banjo fitting as seen in the pic. of 'Elsie'Stuart

Hi All,Next I decided to make the low pressure cylinder...not having a gunmetal casting for this, I fabricated it up silver soldering the parts together.The main cylinder body was machined up from a chunk of cored gunmetal (LG2) that I had to hand....never look a gift-horse in the mouth !! The finished diameter is 2.218; the length 3.875". Set up in the lathe I turned the outside diameter(s) holding the chunk with inside jaws on the cored bore....I held the outer end on its cored bore using a 3-jaw chuck on a ball-bearing spindle in the tailstock.I roughbored it 0.040 undersize on the bore including the counterbores each end where the covers sit.To make up the blocks that form the port-face and underside support I milled gunmetal blocks then mounted them on the vertical slide and using a between-centres boring bar cut the scallops to fit the cylinder mid-diameters..The remaining parts, bottom bolting plate, support webs and bosses for the draincocks were made up from brass plate (BS249) machining brass.The parts were held together by bronze screws down the exhaust port and up through the centre of the bottom plate. The webs and bosses held by jamming or soft iron wire. The assembly was fluxed up all-round and silver soldered with Silverflow 55.After pickling clean the cylinder was set up in the lathe once more....the bore and counterbores were finished and the ends faced.The covers were machined up from continuous-cast grey iron bar drilled for cover studs using the toolpost drilling spindle (with chuck backplate detent), as were the tapping size holes (6BA) in the cylinders. The holes were tapped quickly using one of my Geo. Thomas tapping/staking machines.I hope the pics are self-explanatory...Cheers,Stuart

Hi All,Thanks Terry for your comment; if it helps someone, maybe even provoking a thought, then it makes it worthwhile.... I must have learned something worthwhile in over 60 years in the workshop !!As a little aside I thought I'd show a couple of workshop 'machines' that help with accuracy as well as in production rates..When it comes to items such as cylinder covers, glands and flanges etc., that have an array of bolts/studs one of the basic methods to gain accurate pitch circles/divisions is to have some form of indexing system. Rotary tables/ dividing heads/ and using digital read-out are amongst other methods. A far simpler, easily accessible means is using an indexer attached directly to the main machine in the workshop, your lathe.Some years ago I 'standardised' my chuck threads used on the lathe, dividing head, rotary table chuck, and indexer to that of the lathe... 1.5" dia x 8tpi w/f....thought that a logical step. I took a little time one afternoon to drill the periphery of all my chuck backplates with 48 holes with a BS4 centre drill using the dividing head. This will allow common useful factors such as 2, 3, 4,6,8,12 .A swing clear arm attached to the headstock of the lathe can position the spring-loaded detent over the chuck. Thought...when the detent is in place DON'T SWITCH ON THE SPINDLE MOTOR !! I've done it several times !!!! It also pays to mark the indexing steps on the hole circle using a felt-tip pen to aid repetition mistakes. 6 hole steps gives 8 holes positions on pcd. etc..Using the toolpost drilling spindle, the spindle bore of which was drilled/reamed/ bored in situthus ensuring accuracy. The centre/start-point is easily attained by placing a centre in the t/stock and parallel centre in the chuck to line up . The pitch circle radius can then be set by using the cross-slide feedscrew, a rule, or digital read out whathaveyou.The spindle is driven by a 80watt sewing machine motor and I put a domestic dimmer switch on the supply to give speed control.....I only hope I can get the motor back on domestic managements sewing machine before she decides to use it next!!I usually put a BS1 centre drill in the small Jacobs chuck and 'spot' the locations....drilling for tapping size/clearance as appropriate on the drilling machine. All the cover, flanges and glands were done like this.Although I have an Archer No2MT tapper , it is often easier to tap the holes using part of my George Thomas (of hallowed memory) tapping attachment...it gives vertical guidance and very good 'feel' for small taps such as 8BA. I've attached a pic of the 'tapping' machine and next to it one of the developments George made for closing small rivets.I hope the attachments help explain my ramblings Cheers for now, Stuart

Hi All,Just returned from 10 days in South & Mid Wales, which ended with a trip up the Vale of Rheidol railway, by accident of course !!Back to the Duplex Corliss....The castings I had to hand included the high and intermediate pressure cylinders, both in LG2 gunmetal.These will eventually be chemically blackened and grey iron end covers fitted.The blocks were milled all over with a face mill; then the cored holes thin plugged with aluminium and the centres of the bores set out using the surface plate/height gauge.The castings were then set up in the 4-jaw independent chuck and the centre dot set to run true.( Use a tailstock centre and a second full centre supported between bore centre dot and tailstock centre; use a dti on the large diameter of the follower centre, adjusting the chuck jaws to suit)The bores were roughed out and then finish bored to size ( 1.125dia. HP; 1.625dia. IP)The live steam and exhaust chambers were slot drilled into the top and bottoms of the castings and the Corliss rotary valve bores marked out and drilled and reamed to size. (5/16" dia. HP inlet; 3/8" exhaust. IP cylinder 3/8" inlet 7/16" exhaust)The ports are cut from the bottom/top of the chambers to meet the Corliss rotary valve bore on centre line. It required a !" dia x 0.090" wide saw type cutter (like a Woodruf)....a size I did't have....so I made one up from silver steel (drill rod to those across the pond). I turned up the blank to tooth dia. spec., turned a shank on it to fit the ER25 collet chuck then using the indexer head on the miller formed eight teeth with primary and secondary clearances.The chest cover plates were made up of gunmetal off-cuts...stud holes drilled/threaded with provision for steam studded flanges and exhaust below with nut/olive....out of sight in the baseboard.The Corliss valve spindle bonnets were turned up from phos. bronze; stud holes indexed and drilled using the toolpost drilling spindle/chuck indexing system in each bonnet and covers and the stud threads drilled and tapped into the blocks. In this case, as there were 192 8BA holes to tap I used the Archer machine tapper in the drilling machine, much easier !!Pics. attached.Cheers Stuart